Generally, an air conditioner is a system that is used to control the temperature, relative humidity or purity of air, ad to circulate cooled air in an enclosed space such as a room. The air conditioner is classified into an integration type where all of components are provided in a unit and a separation type having indoor and outdoor units separated from each other.
FIG. 1 shows a perspective view of an indoor unit of a conventional air conditioner.
Referring to FIG. 1, an indoor unit of a conventional air conditioner includes a main chassis 1 mounted on an inner wall of a room, a front panel 3 installed in front of the main chassis 1, an air intake grill 5a formed on the front panel 3, and an air discharge grill 7 installed on a lower end of the front panel 3. A display unit 9 for display a current operation state and guiding the manipulation of a user is installed between the air intake and discharge grills 5a and 7.
Meanwhile, another intake grill 5b may be further provided on a top surface of the main chassis 1. In addition, the front panel 3 may be provided at a lower end with a hole in which an air discharge unit for guiding the downward discharge of the cooled air can be fitted.
The conventional air conditioner has the following problems.
Since the front panel 3 is provided at the lower end with only a receiving hole having a size identical to the air discharge unit, it is difficult to assemble the air discharge grill, air discharge panel 170 and air discharge louver and to perform the maintenance service.
In addition, during the discharge of the cooled air to the room, the cooled air may leak through a coupling portion between the main chassis and the front panel.
Furthermore, since a temperature sensor is installed on a front surface of the heat exchanger, it is difficult to accurately measure the room temperature. That is, the temperature detected by the temperature sensor is closer to the surface temperature of the heat-exchanger and thus the room temperature cannot be accurately detected by the temperature sensor.